Viva la trivia...
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"A long long time
ago...American Pie is a tribute to Buddy Holly
McLean seems to be
lamenting the lack of "danceable" music in rock and roll....I can still
remember how That music used to make me smile. And I knew if I had my chance, That I could
make those people dance,And maybe they'd be happy for a while...But February made me
shiver, Buddy Holly died on February 3, 1959 in a plane crash in Iowa during a
snowstorm. ...With every paper I'd deliver...,Don McLean's only job
besides being a singer-songwriter was being a paperboy....Bad news on the
doorstep...I couldn't take one more step.I can't remember if I cried When I read about his
widowed bride... Holly's recent bride was pregnant....But something
touched me deep inside, The day the music died. The same plane crash that killed
Buddy Holly also took the lives of Richie Valens ("La Bamba") and The Big Bopper
("Chantilly Lace"). Since all three were so prominent at the time, February 3,
1959 became known as "The Day The Music Died".
So... Bye bye Miss
American Pie,Don McLean dated a Miss America candidate during the pageant.
...Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry Them good ol' boys were
drinkin whiskey and rye Singing "This'll be the day that I die, This'll be the day
that I die." One of Holly's hits was "That'll be the Day";
the chorus contains the line "That'll be the day that I die".
...And moss grows fat on a rolling stone...Bob Dylan,
since
"Like a Rolling Stone" (1965) was his first major hit; and since he was busy
writing songs extolling the virtues of simple love, family and contentment ....But
that's not how it used to be When the jester sang for the King and Queen... The
jester is Bob Dylan.The King and Queen refers to the Kennedys who were present at a
Washington DC civil rights rally featuring Martin Luther King. (There's a recording of
Dylan performing at this rally.)...In a coat he borrowed from James Dean In
the movie "Rebel Without a Cause", James Dean has a red windbreaker that holds
symbolic meaning throughout the film.On the cover of "The Freewheelin' Bob
Dylan", Dylan is wearing just such as red windbreaker, and is posed in a street scene
similar to one shown in a well-known picture of James Dean.
...And a voice that came from you and me... Bob Dylan's roots are in
American folk music, with people like Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie. Folk music is by
definition the music of the masses, hence the "...came from you and me". ...Oh,
and while the King was looking down The jester stole his thorny crown ... A
reference to Elvis's 
decline and Dylan's ascendance. The
thorny crown might be a reference to the price of fame. Dylan has said that he wanted to
be as famous as Elvis, one of his early idols.......And while Lennon read a book
on Marx, Literally, John Lennon 
reading about Karl Marx; figuratively,
the introduction of radical politics into the music of the Beatles.or was it the influence
of Groucho Marx 
on Lennons lyrics ...The quartet
practiced in the park... The Beatles playing in Shea Stadium. ...And we
sang dirges in the dark... A "dirge" is a funeral or mourning song, so
perhaps this is meant literally... The day the music died. We were singing...
...Helter Skelter in a
summer swelter "Helter Skelter" is a Beatles song which appears on the
"white" album. Charles Manson, claiming to have been "inspired" by the
song (through which he thought God and/or the devil were taking to him) led his followers
in the Tate-LaBianca murders. ...The birds flew off with the fallout shelter
Eight miles high and falling fast The Byrd's "Eight Miles High" was on
their late 1966 release "Fifth Dimension". It was one of the first records to be
widely banned because of supposedly drug-oriented lyrics. ...It landed foul on the
grass ...The players tried for a forward pass A football metaphor, but about
what? It could be the Rolling Stones, i.e. they were waiting for an opening which really
didn't happen until the Beatles broke up.
...With the jester on the sidelines in a cast On July 29, 1966, Dylan
crashed his Triumph 55 motorcycle while riding near his home in Woodstock, New York. He
spent nine months in seclusion while recuperating from the accident. ...Now the
halftime air was sweet perfume.. Drugs !!! ...While sergeants played a
marching tune Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band".
...We
all got up to dance Oh, but we never got the chance... The Beatles' 1966
Candlestick Park concert only lasted 35 minutes. ...'Cause the players tried to
take the field, The marching band refused to yield....Mc Lean was of the view
that Beatles music was not dancable.This could be a reference to the dominance of the
Beatles on the rock and roll scene. ...Do you recall what was revealed, The
day the music died? ...And there we were all in one 
place Woodstock,
what else !!! ...A generation lost in space The US space program or or a
reference to hippies, who were sometimes known as the "lost generation". ...With
no time left to start again... The "lost generation" spent too much
time being stoned, and had wasted their lives !!!
...So come on Jack 
be nimble Jack be quick...Probably
a reference to Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones; "Jumpin' Jack Flash" was
released in May, 1968. ...Jack Flash sat on a candlestick... The Stones'
Candlestick park concert ...'Cause fire is the devil's only friend
Grateful Dead's "Friend of the Devil"....And as I watched him on the
stage My hands were clenched in fists of rage No angel born in hell Could break that
satan's spell... While playing a concert at the Altamont Speedway in 1968,
the Stones appointed members of the Hell's Angels to work security (on the advice of the
Grateful Dead).
In the darkness near the front of
the stage, a young man named Meredith Hunter was beaten and stabbed to death -- by the
Angels. Public outcry that the song "Sympathy for the Devil" had somehow incited
the violence caused the Stones to drop the song from their show for the next six years. ...And
as the flames climbed high into the night To light the sacrificial rite... Mick
Jagger's prancing and posing while it was happening. ...I saw satan laughing
with delight 
Satan being Jagger....The day the
music died...I met a girl who sang the blues... Janis Joplin.
...And I asked her for some happy news But she just smiled and turned away...Janis
died of an accidental heroin overdose
on October 4, 1970....I went down
to the sacred store Where I'd heard the music years before... The "sacred
store" was Bill Graham's Fillmore West, one of the great rock and roll venues of all
time. ...But the man there said the music wouldn't playPerhaps he means
that nobody is interested in hearing Buddy Holly et.al.'s music? ...And in the
streets the children screamed "Flower children" being beaten by police
and National Guard troops; in particular, perhaps, the People's Park riots in Berkeley in
1969 and 1970....The lovers cried and the poets dreamed... The trend
towards psychedelic music in the 60's? ...But not a word was spoken The church
bells all were broken...
It could be that the broken bells are the dead musicians: neither can produce any more
music.
...And the three men I admire most The Father, Son and Holy Ghost... Holly,
The Big Bopper, and Valens ...They caught the last train for the coast Western
culture often uses "went west" as a synonym for dying).
...And they were singing...
Bye, bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
Them good ol' boys were drinkin whiskey and rye
Singing "This'll be the day that I die.
This'll be the day that I die."
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